Are you ready for me to expose it all?

Strip Tease*

Is it alright if I take it off?

I mean, for so long I've had to hide what is brewing inside and I'm tired.
Tired of having to portray the fake me so you can see who you think I should be.
With this guise I have to mask my desires and the naughty thoughts that I sire in secret.
Can I share them with you?

I promise it's not as bad as you may think.

It's true my goal is to succeed and not to let others bleed from me my personal beliefs.
But this doesn't mean I think I know it all and that you all are beneath me.
Are you feeling me?

I don't always smile.

Beneath what you see I harbor scars of a reality that you have yet to behold.
At the age of 10 my view of sex was defined by boy and girl cousins entwined in a union of husband and wife.
I was used by kin and had to begin to mask that me that felt unworthy to be seen.
As I proceeded from there I suffered with despair and became aware of the anger burning me from inside.

I had to let it out.

Through the pen is where it would begin to be extinguished.
I told of my feelings of being betrayed by those I trusted and having to hide it.
I wrote of dreams achieved and the fiery coals heaped upon the heads of those who doubted me.

But I'm not through undressing.

I want to explore just one stanza more of my life and prepare you for what is to come.

Just don't judge me.

Before you turn away let me have my say, and then make your choice.
When the whole story is told and I stand fully exposed then we will truly see.
That the emotions and struggles you've dealt with yourself
Are summed up in the chapters of the volume that produced me.

2002 C. A. Webb©
* “Strip Tease” appears courtesy of Dark Angel Productions and appears in C. A. Webb’s 2004 release MY VOICE: THE COMPILATION.